Ashes Of The Unhewn Throne Books in Order
Part ofBrian Staveley Books in OrderSee Ashes of the Unhewn Throne by Brian Staveley with the books in order, short plot summaries, series background, and guidance on reading this sequel series.
Last updated: December 24, 2025
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Publication Order
1 book
The Empire's Ruin
by Brian Staveley
2021
The Annurian Empire is falling apart, its war hawks scattered and its magical gates broken. A disgraced Kettral soldier, a monk turned con artist, and a reluctant priest are sent on impossible journeys that might save their world or finish it.
Series background & context
Ashes of the Unhewn Throne returns to the Annurian Empire after the dust of the original trilogy has settled. The war with the gods is over, but the cost of survival has hollowed out the empire's power and left its people scattered and raw. This new series picks up those pieces and asks what rebuilding looks like when your foundations are cracked.
Several years have passed since the earlier books, and the institutions that once held Annur together are failing. The Kettral, the empire's legendary hawk riding commandos, are almost wiped out. The kenta gates, magical portals that once made distant provinces feel close, are broken or dangerous to use. On the borders, subject peoples and rival powers sense weakness and start to push back.
Into that chaos step a new set of protagonists. Gwenna Sharpe, a battered former Kettral commander, is given one last, nearly impossible mission to redeem herself. She must lead an expedition across a hostile ocean and into a continent warped by strange forces, searching for the nesting grounds of the giant war hawks that once carried the empire's soldiers. The farther her crew sails, the stranger and more lethal the landscape becomes.
Far to the south, Ruc Lakatur Lan Lac, a priest of a much mistrusted goddess of love, watches his swamp bound city slide toward religious violence. When a new cult rises and the streets erupt, Ruc and his partner Bien are dragged into an arena culture that demands blood in the name of competing gods. Their story balances moments of tenderness with brutal questions about faith, guilt, and the pull of old loyalties.
Akiil, a former monk turned thieves' guild fixer, provides a different view again. Back in the heart of the empire, he tries to turn his knowledge of the broken kenta gates into one big score, conning those in power while dodging people who remember exactly where he came from. His chapters add a thread of crooked humor and street level scheming to the wider tale of collapsing empires and awakening powers.
Together these arcs show a world fraying at every edge, where small, personal choices can echo out into political catastrophe.
Ashes of the Unhewn Throne keeps the philosophical questions and dense world building that defined the earlier trilogy, but pushes them into even stranger territory. Expect long journeys into unknown lands, desperate arena fights, and quiet moments of doubt between characters who are not sure they deserve to be heroes. It is a series for readers who like to see what happens after the supposed victory, when people have to live with what they have done and decide what comes next.
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